Vela Pulsar

The initial glitch observation for the Vela pulsar in March, 1969, was followed by observations of another three glitches within the decade. Nine subsequent Vela pulsar glitches that occurred between 1985 and 2006 were observed at the Hartebesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory, South Africa. An analysis by Sarah Buchner showed post-glitch behavior can be understood using three distinct relaxation times, 0.49 d, 5.4 d, and 49 d, consistent with the postglitch behavior expected for the response of superfluid vortices in distinct pinning regimes in the neutron star that had been previously identified by Ali Alpar of Sabanci University and his colleagues. (Unit: 8)